Conclusion

My goal was to create a complete album that both musicians and laymen enjoy alike. While I can’t know that everyone has enjoyed it, i‘ve gotten positive feedback from musicians as well as everyday people, and I am certainly proud of the effort. Though this project was supposed to take 80 hours, I regularly put in 16-hour days all summer long, spending literally many hundreds of hours writing, and producing, and recording the project. I was also excited to involve my other areas of expertise including audio engineering, digital audio production, and graphic design.

After completing this project, I can safely say that I’ve actually applied and used nearly everything I learned last year and more. Pop songs can be very simple and predictable, and it was enjoyable to add little flourishes throughout the album, displaying some degree of musical prowess and adding more complex colors to a traditionally bland palette. This summer, I found that the best motivation to learn about a subject comes when the subject helps you to better pursue what you love. While I still operate at a fairly rudimentary level of music theory, I’m learning more by the day and enjoying the process. While I could have written songs without thinking about any theory, it’s been rewarding to hear the benefit of more complex musical structures. Also, it’s nice to understand why things sound good from a technical point of view, and it’s a challenge to create new sounds and feelings with the expanded musical tools I’m acquiring. This project has reinforced what I already knew, forced me to practice what I didn’t know, prompted me to discover further with hands-on music making, and caused me to look forward to further learning and application within music theory. I’m extremely satisfied with the product, and very thankful for the opportunity to create it.